Security, Fire & Electrical Safety thru Common Sense not Political Correctness.
Those who don't study the past will repeat its errors.

"The Building is the Enemy Know the Enemy" -- Late-Francis Brannigan (Father of Modern Construction knowledge for the Fire Service and Friend)

Remember The fire Service is its on worst enemy- Nick Markowitz Jr.

Friday, September 20, 2013

Cleaning up old wiring on Sprinkler system results in finding some very critical code issues which could lead to there failure.

I am currently working on a very large fire and security project in a warehouse with a licensed master electrician who is a young 75 years old and still loves doing his job every day.
we finnaly the other day got around to cleaning up all the wiring mess in what was the old sprinkler room which they took the walls down around it to allow it to be open and visible instead of hidden.
Upon closer inspection after we started to remove old un needed wiring I noticed 2 very critical problems with this system where major mistakes where made and could result in it not functioning properly.

First problem is the 1 1/2" pipe on left riser pipe which runs to maintenance room it is below the flow valve if the heads on this pipe would activate there will be no alarm and building could easily flood because water is not going thru flow vavle but the most critical problem I found was that this was originally a dry system which was converted to a wet system when it kept leaking air and the main dry release valves where left in place instead of being converted to wet valves . The flapper in the valves could malfunction and prevent flow of water at needed rate. The individual who did this is no longer around but if he where there would be serious rep-ructions from the fire marshals office.
Luckily I have some sprinkler training and caught this problem which there have been how many professionals in doing annual tests and they never caught it after almost 15 years or just chose to ignore it. Which tells me they where not doing there job and needless to say my customer is now using a new company to do there work.

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-----------------------------------The purpose of this blog is to provide comment and information on a wide variety of issues relating to Fire, Security, Electrical, Safety,Communications , Good Trade Practice and Consumer Issues References will be provided using National Electric Code (NEC) , National Fire Protection Assoc.( NFPA) , ICC , ADA as well as other code sets where necessary.

Disclaimer : All due care is taken to provide true and accurate information. However always call and check with a professional before acting on anything your read in this Blog as changes are always happening with Codes,Standards and Regulations. This information is for general knowledge on a subject and should not be relied on.

Nick Markowitz is a Trade Writer, an Electrician and an expert in the Security and Life Safety Markets. With over 35 years experience. Here in his personal blog you will find helpful technical tips as well as personal comments and life experiences. Nick has over 1500 articles he has published in many different magazines ,websites newspapers and other media on many different subjects

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